kyesadventure

Round up of our three weeks in Malaysia

Malaysia has been absolutely incredible. Such a fun varied experience and there wasn’t one place here I didnt enjoy. It is cheap, the food is incredible and the people are extremely friendly!

KL- was my favourite big city I’ve ever visited, it was really clean, easy to get around, plenty to do and lots of food to try. We stayed at the dreamville hostel which had a cool backpacker vibe. Wish we spent an extra day here, if you visit make sure you visit the Sky Bar for the best view of the Petronas Towers! The Batu caves and the night markets here were also well worth a visit and all of this can be done for free.
Taman Negara rain forest was good fun, we spent 5 days camping here at Danz eco resort which was hard work but fun! Be prepared to get sweaty, smelly and see plenty of bugs here. The canopy walk was good, don’t use a guide and you’ll save a few quid.. the rapid shooting was great but I don’t know if I’d visit the nomadic village again as the people were pretty arrogant and weren’t in the slightest bit poor. The food here was really good and cost next to nothing.. to be honest we hardly spent anything during our time here I’d guess averaging at about £12 per day including accommodation and trips.. it would be less if I didn’t eat so much!
Spent a few days at the Tok Aman Bali hotel in Kuala Besut to chill and get our shit together after being dirty rainforest tramps. Wasn’t too much to do here but the hotel was awesome and the food was great! Just caught up on some rest as we knew we’d be busy on the islands. It was an absolute bargain at £15 per night each including a lovely all you can eat breakfast buffet.
The Perhentian islands we’re hands down my favourite place we’ve visited so far. We stayed at the Barat resort in a lovely beach hut. Theres not much here to do bar snorkel, dive and chill on the beach but it’s incredible and me and paige both loved every second. Thsee islands are beautiful and nowhere near as touristy as other islands I’ve visited. Every night we ate a BBQ on the beach consisTing of different fish, chicken, lamb, potatoes and vegetables.. i think I could eat this for the rest of my life and not get bored! The views were amazing, the beaches were beautiful, we saw lots of fish, turtles, stingray and jellyfish lol. As expected it was alot more expensive than the other parts of Malaysia we visited for accommodation and food but worth every penny.. however to put this in perspective it’s still much cheaper than moat places in Europe, juSt dear for this part of the world!
Penang was a cool island on the west coast which is famous for its great food and street art. We stayed at guesthouse 109 in Georgetown. There’s plenty to see and do here for free! The best food we found were at the local hawker centres which offered a large variety of food and drink including Malaysian, western and BBQ for good prices. It’s full of locals with a good atmosphere and free musical performances all evening. We spent 3 days here and it was about right.. if you’re a real foodie you’ll want longer!

All in all we had a cracking time in Malaysia, definitely a pleasant surprise as apart from the Perhentian we didnt know too much about it! Can definitely recommend this as a holiday destination and even somewhere you can bring kids. We didn’t move around as much as we did in Sri Lanka, which I personally preferred (only visiting 5 places in 3 weeks instead of 6). Despite being only 1 place less it felt a much more relaxed pace and gave us more time to explore and enjoy our stays.. plus travel days are alot harder than you think! I’d recommend all our accommodation that we stayed in whilst in Malaysia, wit the exception of maybe the rain forest.. I personally enjoyed it but can imagine it’s not suited to everyone!

Money wise we spent around £730 for 3 weeks which was slightly more than Sri Lanka. Overall I’d say Malaysia was cheaper than Sri Lanka but spending a week at the Perhentian islands definitely jumped our budget up considerably (completely worth it!). I’d say this was a middle of the road figure as we didn’t splash out needlessly but definitely enjoyed our food and stayed in reasonably comfy backpacker accommodation (bar the tent in the rainforest lol). I’d guess if you were on a really tight budget you could probably half this figure by staying in shared dorms and eating less meat and less often whilst still getting a similar experience!

Perhentian islands part two and the island of Penang

During the second half of our week in the Perhentian islands we met up with Paige’s friend Steff and her friend Fran, who it turned out knew alot of my weird mates from school! It was nice to have some company so we spent alot of our time with them.

We had some of the hottest days yet on the islands so decided to do another snorkling trip. Saw some big fish and our first sting ray, but all of a sudden the fish disappeared and we found ourselves swimming through a swarm of fucking jelly fish! We all shit ourselves as we were getting stung all over and weren’t sure how poisonous these little bastards were. Luckily most of the stings stopped hurting after about 20 minutes! Then at the next snorkling spot we tentatively got in the water after our boat driver assured us we’d be fine.. everything was fine and we snorkled and swam to the beach, on the way back to the boat we were hit by another swarm of the bastards and got stung even worse! My lips, ears and bald head were particularly painful.. the second time was less scary as we knew we weren’t going to die but it still hurt!!

Me and paige pissing about in the shallow water before those ugly little fucks attacked us again!

The next day Paige, Steff and myself had arranged to go scuba diving for the first time.. the thought of this had always really scared me but it looks amazing and every one I know who has done it has loved it so it was time for me to grow a pair and give it a go. Now I’m a pretty composed guy, on the odd occasion I’m nervous you won’t really know about it and there’s not much I won’t try (except crystal meth.. that shit fucks you up!) But during the pre dive briefing I was absolutely freaking out! I struggle to swim as it is so the thought of having a heavy tank on my back, a weighted belt and a load of stupid hand signals to remember was terrifying, so much so that I actually contemplated running away when I went to the changing rooms to get into my wetsuit lol!

The girls eventually calmed me down and persuaded me to give it a go but I was adament I wasn’t going to go more than 2-3 meters deep!

After the dive talk I had a word with myself and stopped being a little bitch. by the time we were in the chest high water I felt alot calmer and when doing the under water drills was repeating to myself “it’s just like a snorkel”. When we were all happy the guide signalled us to follow him; as soon as we started seeing all the different fish and the amazing coral I forgot about my fear and just swam along taking it all in. Before we knew it we were over 7m deep, I was calm and somehow enjoying myself! Steff took some great photos and videos which she recovered after from her not so waterproof new go pro.

The time in the water went so fast! The girls did great, we all enjoyed it and all 3 of us said we’d love to dive again! I highly recommend this to anyone even if you’re scared as it made the whole experience even better conquering such a big fear!

Paige flirting with the diving instructor.. don’t blame her really as she had just watched her boyfriend turn into an absolute bitch!

Our week here was incredible, what a place! This was our favourite place so far on the trip and can’t recommend it enough but unfortunately it was time to leave. We took the overnight bus to Penang.. the bus was really comfortable and only cost around £8 for an 8 and a half hour journey, newbie traveller mistake; we booked seats right by the door so were woken up every 30 minutes or so by people getting on and off. Steff and Fran were also heading here on a later flight. We arrived at 5am saturday morning in Penang and met up with one of my school friends, the one and only James Black. I hadn’t seen this guy for years (until seeing him at a bbq in june) as he’s been kicking ass as a composer in Copenhagen and had messaged me a few days before that he was also backpacking through Malaysia so we spent the day getting a tour of his favourite places to eat and drink!

Wish I could grow a beard like that.. he looks like a rugged lumberjack/porn star!

Steff and Fran arrived on the night time so we all went to the local hawker centre to sample their unbelievable food, listen to Malaysian entertainers enthusiastically belt out cheesy songs and get absolutely hammered! We hit some bars, drank on plastic furnature outside a hardware shop and visited “slippery senoritas” club Haha. We ended the night with a curry and staggered in just after 3am 🤘.

Group photo in slippery senoritas.. it was full of weekend millionaires and the drinks here were 2-3 times the price of anywhere else we visited. But with a name like that you’ve got to give it a go!

The next day me and Paige spent a few hours walking off our hangovers admiring the fantastic street art that Penang is famous for (along with its amazing food). Didn’t think it would appeal to me that much but I really enjoyed it!

By the evening we were absolutely hanging so grabbed a bit of food, watched Alverez/GGG and had an early night. Today we had a lie in, sorted out our transport and accommodation for Thailand, did our Laundry and hit a session at the local gym. We met the current light heavy weight Malaysian bodybuilding champion (he had won the last 5 years running) that worked at the gym! He was a nice guy and we talked a bit about training. The guesthouse we stayed in was really nice and had lots of cool animals including an indoor well with turtles in! Overall we’ve had a wicked few days in Penang and it was a nice contrast to our experience on the east coast. We head North to Krabi in thailand tomorrow for some more beach time 😎

Me stinking and absolutely ringing with sweat after our squat session with the 5x Mr Malaysia. He was a fan of my blog and wanted a photo.. I’ve not let the fame go to my head so I happily obliged Haha! This photo did not do him justice as he looked alot bigger than this in person.

Kuala besut and the amazing Perhentian islands

After 5 days of living like tramps in the rainforest we planned a few days rest and relaxation at a nice hotel in Kuala Besut.. it’s not really a tourist destination as people just pass through to get to the Perhentian Islands so we managed to get a a very posh hotel for about £15 per night each including the breakfast buffet!

The Tok Amen Bali resort was heaven compared to our two man tent and half the price of a shitting travel lodge in the UK!

This place had a pool, surrounded by ponds full of big, colourful fish and the whole resort was surrounded by a lake. Unfortunately Paige came down with pretty bad case of shitting and puking, but of all the places to be Ill on our trip this was definitely the comfiest so far! So we just had 3 days rest and relaxation here. The food here was out of this world and cheap as fuck so fat Kye came back for a couple of days! I think the people at the hotel were quite shocked at my gluttony lol. Breakfast was usually 6-9 eggs (omelette form) on toast, a plate of whatever fruit they had on offer, 2 bowls of cerial, washed down with several glasses of fruit juice.. popped it into my fitness pal and it was coming out at over 2000 cals so stopped myself there.

The lamb chops were amazing.. only came to £3 and this was the most expensive thing theu sold so you can’t just have one meal!

The evening meals were even better and there was a market stalls set up in the garden selling different types of food from local to western. I think by the end of the 3 days I’d sampled nearly every stall one particular evening eating 3 meals and a dessert 🤐. Was absolutely awesome and the combined total for mime and Paiges food never came to more the £12!

The food at this mock up market was absolutely shit hot!

After our chilled out 3 days were over it was time to leave and we took the 45 minute speed boat to the Perhentian Islands.

Some good looking fucker paige snapped getting off our boat.. views not bad either!

This was one of the places we were looking forward to visiting most in our whole trip, so much so that we even changed the order of our entire trip as the islands are closed in the winter months!

Paige modelling our beach hut, a bit more pricey than other accommodation in Malaysia but definitely worth the extra money!

If you’re after a party island this isn’t the place but if you want incredible views, food and snorkeling with a chilled out atmosphere then definitely add these islands to your bucket list! Weve done plenty of snorkling and it has been absolutely incredible, hands down the clearest water and biggest variety of sea life I’ve ever seen!

We found nemo! He was hard work to get a decent picture of the little bastard

Paige thinking she’s the little mermaid!

Just swimming along the beach and we saw a swarm of different types of fish trying to eat the eggs from a fish’s nest. One of the parents was trying as hard as they could to fight them off but there were loads of the fuckers!

We’ve also rented a kyak and paddled to a few of the beaches around the islands.. they were alot further than they looked! We are staying at the Barat hotel and the food here is great, they do a massive bbq every night with different fish, lamb and chicken.. its a bit more expensive than the rest of Malaysia but still amazing value for money! We’ve got a few more days here and are looking to do some more snorkling spots and give scuba diving a go so will keep you updated.. Peace!

Barramundi fish from the BBQ.. absolutely amazing!

Kuala Lumpur and Taman Negara rainforest

We flew from Singapore to KL which took us an hour and cost about £30. We stayed at the dreamville hostel for 3 nights which was pretty cool and was near to the train station so it was easy to get around. The food even in the capital was dirt cheap even for western food!

My weekly naughty meal consisted of this and a 9 inch chicken pizza which in total cost £3.50 at the main shopping centre food court in KL!

We visited the Batu caves which were an impressive site. The taxi drivers here were so friendly and helpful and wouldn’t accept a tip! There was building work going on in the caves and some creepy looking religious statues. This cave was free to visit, there were a couple of others that cost a bit but we were happy with the main caves.

Some of the impressive rock formations in the Batu caves

We caught a taxi to a night market where we sampled some of the local food and got caught in a fuck off thunder storm. The locals were so friendly and everyone was really happy despite being drenched! On the way we saw a bloke get smashed off his motorbike, so i ripped open my shirt to expose the superman emblem on my chest, jumped out of the car and pulled the bike off of him with the help of my skinny Malaysian side kick lol. Luckily he was okay and i didnt have to give him mouth to mouth!

Tried some of these weird looking dim sum which are Malaysian pork dumplings, definitely worth a try if you’re in the area!

On our last day we caught the train into the centre which cost about 20p each way and was fully air conditioned. The centre was really clean and despite being a massive, impressive city people were very polite and friendly, something I feel other big cities like Singapore and London can definitely take note of! Petronas towers were fucking awesome; 88 story twin towers that were up until the mid 2000s the tallest building in the world and are still currently the tallest twin towers in the world!

Petronas towers at night from the Sky Bar! To put a scale on it the little thing it’s built on top of is a huge shopping that absolutely dwarfs Cabot circus! By far the most impressive building I’ve seen with my own eyes.

We visited the Sky Bar opposite as we were told it had the best view of the towers and it didn’t disappoint! Us, a pair of smelly backpackers were able to walk up to the pent house bar for free, which included a pool and table service and bought a couple of drinks and admired the view.. Paige absolutely cracked me up whilst we were sat here with a quote something along the lines of “how we’ve gone from shitting in a hole in the floor to being sat here looking at this” I think that definitely sums up our journey so far 😂

The swanky pool at Kuala Lumpur’s sky bar.. Unfortunately I never packed my hot pants or I’d have been in there like a shot!

Our transfer to the rainforest was 6 hours by coach then 3 hours on an uncomfortable boat to the main village.. then a bumpy mainly off road drive to Danz eco resort in their free shuttle bus (a dodgey pickup truck driven like a rally car!). We stayed in a tent here and the place had a lovely chilled out vibe, the people running it were really nice and the all you can eat BBQS are amazing. BUT there is no hot water, most of the showers don’t work and there are bugs everywhere! Still for £4 each per night with breakfast included you can’t complain.

Our rainforest home for 5 days.. Definitely felt and smelt like a proper backpacker living out of one of these!

The rainforest was awesome, its supposed to be the oldest in the world and something I really wanted to do. Paige wasn’t too keen at the start but eventually she loved it. The first day was a national holiday so alot of activities were closed, so we explored the some of the rain forest and went for a swim.

We visited the jungle canopy walk, we did a bit of reading and this worked out alot cheaper to do without a guide (cost us about £1). The hike here was sweaty as fuck and I smelt like a bad mixture of vinegar and piss by the time we arrived! There was a bit of a wait but the walk was a good laugh and wobbly as fuck!

Today we did rapid shooting on rickity old speedboat, our driver was crazy and had no fingers on either hand but was funny as fuck and had us in stitches the whole time. We were racing and splashing other boats and everyone was soaked by the end!

We then visited a nearby nomadic village where their main food was monkey that they hunted with blow darts. They taught us about how they live and let us have a go with the blow dart gun! We brought biscuits for the kids and not one of the little bastards seemed the slightest bit greatful.. you’d think it would be a nice change from boiled fucking chimp! Lol

Me and Paige were both top monkey killers and hit the target first time with the blow dart gun.. surprised Paige was so good as she’s not used to having things that big in her mouth!

Weve got one more day here before heading off to some amazing beaches.. going to have a down day and try a bit of fishing. Today is one month since we flew out and i’ve loved every minute of it!

Singapore and my first experience of backpacker burnout!

We arrived in Singapore late on Wednesday night after a 4 hour flight. Just flying over it you could see how built up it was from all the bright lights and tall buildings. This is the cleanest most futuristic place I’ve ever been! Didn’t see one tramp, stray dog or piece of rubbish on the floor and didn’t get one wiff of shit! It felt like it was costing me momey just being there lol. The centre is absolutely amazing and so different to any of the places we visited in Sri Lanka.

Me and Paige outside the famous Marina Bay Sands hotel.. I reckon we could have blagged our way to the top but Paige wasn’t keen

The gardens by the bay were pretty impressive.. haven’t got a fucking clue what the trees are supposed to be but we enjoyed spending the afternoon there!

The massive alien looking trees at the garden by the bay

On the night time we saw the most impressive lazer show I’ve ever seen at Marina Bay. Jets shoot up a screen of water and images were projected on to it! Well worth watching if you ever get the chance.

Apart from sight seeing we did a bit of shopping.. my bag was fucked so that needed replacing and we both agreed that we wanted to invest in a decent camera with a good zoom. Have yet to try it out but it looks good! We also visited little India and a few other places. There is a lot of high end shopping here and a lot of very rich people around!

The state of my backpack as we were leaving Sri Lanka! I’ve had it for 5 years so definitely had good use out of it!

As for this backpacker burn out.. travelling is hard! I’d read about it in other peoples blogs but of course, being a typical bloke it wont ever happen to me.. I’m to tough and determined for that shit! Paige had taken a more sensible aproach by sleeping in a bit more and having relaxing evenings. But my first thought on a chilled out afternoon or an easy morning is finding a local gym and squatting myself stupid or hitting bodyweight workouts and shadow boxing. Coupling this with walking miles (10 hours some days carrying our bags for nearly a month now) this has absolutely flattened me! The last 2 days I’ve been hanging so will learn from this and not be so full on.

Paige copying her new Chinese tourist friends

Have overspent our budget here a bit but it’s nothing we weren’t expecting. There’s plenty to do and see for free and even more if you’re not on a backpackers budget. The food in the centre is similar to what you would pay in central London but a short walk outside you can grab a decent meal for under £5. It’s a weird feeling from being well off in Sri Lanka to having to watch our spending closely in Singapore! Taxis here are pretty reasonable and no locals seem to walk anywhere, we had walked for fucking hours each day before finding this out so I’m just letting you know lol. For me the one thing I have found irritating is how rude some of the Chinese tourists are! Don’t get me wrong some of them have been really nice, for example a young chinese family we made friends with made chinese tea and brought it to our room to share with us but others are arrogant as fuck, have no manners and quite frankly need a slap. Apart from that it’s a wicked place, really westernised and definitely worth a visit. We’ve really enjoyed our few days here but are flying out to Kuala lumpar in the morning!

Awesome views of the Marina bay at night time

Ella, the mountains and a round up of our 3 weeks in Sri Lanka!

We arrived in Ella on Saturday and this was to be our last stop in Sri Lanka. It’s a beautiful place surrounded by mountains and tea plantations. We had booked in at Mellow homestay to stay with a Sri Lanken family. It was spot on, cost us around £7.50 each per night and a big breakfast in the mornings for £2.50. The family were really nice and the location was great.

The view of Ella rock from the front garden of our homestay!

We arrived pretty early the first day, so we dropped our bags off, grabbed some lunch and headed straight up to climb Ella rock. Usually I’ll do a bit of research on things like this but didn’t bother this time, it wasn’t really sign posted so we just walked towards the rock and asked people for directions.. we were sent up a small lane and bumped into a little boy who said he would show us the way, which we thought was very kind of him. So we followed him up a fuck off steep set of steps up the side of the mountain.. thought it was a bit weird that we didnt see another person heading to this popular tourist attraction. Long story short he took us half way up, we gave him some money and he gave us directions to the top.. the little fucker had sent us for a free climb to the top of the mountain and it was dangerous as fuck! By the time we realised how much he’d fucked us we were most of the way up and it would have been more dangerous to go back down! EVENTUALLY after a few close calls we got onto the normal path with the rest of the backpackers and made our way to the top of Ella rock!

Amazing views at the top! Don’t let Paige’s smile fool you.. her only thoughts at the top were finding that boy and smashing his teeth out! 👊

We admired the view from the top dripping in sweat but pleased not to be dead before heading back down. No way in he’ll were we going back down that way! So we followed some packpackers the “safe” way down from the rock walking down the train tracks for a few km Haha.

Paige walking down the live train tracks.. health and safety is still yet to be enforced in most of Sri Lanka.. luckily no trains came!

The whole hike took us about 6 hours up and down, Paige came away with an infected foot from an insect bite that had rubbed during the climb.. if you do climb Ella rock, a quick search on Google will show you an easy, painless way to get there.. don’t do what we did! And never ever follow a 12 year old boy up the side of a fucking cliff! Lol.

Because of Paige’s foot we had an easier day on sunday and did some sight seeing in the morning and had a relaxing afternoon.

No sign of the Hogwarts express whilst we were there!

We vsited the 9 arch bridge which looked like a scene straight out of Harry Potter and then stopped off at Ravana waterfall.

I think this was the equivalent to a spa/swimming pool for the locals! This was despite several no swimming signs lol

The last day we hiked up little adam’s peak. We wanted to do the big adams peak but we’re told it wasn’t the time of year for it due to bad viability etc.. so that saved us a long ass train journey! The little peak was good enough and Paige braved it with her war wound. Luckily the climb was alot easier with path or stairs nearly all the way. Was an awesome view of Ella rock and the whole city.

Shortly after this photo Paige got caught up in the moment and got down on one knee.. I had to let her down gently 😂

Definitely recommend a visit to Ella for some sight seeing if you visit Sri Lanka. Cracking place and can easily be done on a backpackers budget!

The food here is amazing and eating local food will save you a lot of money.. this Sri Lanken chicken curry cost about £2.50 in a nice resteraunt.. the steak here however was about £15!

We are leaving Sri Lanka tomorrow after a pretty full on 3 weeks and it’s been amazing, easily one of my favourite countries I’ve visited. Definitely go if you get the chance; the people are amazing, the scenery is awesome and so varied, the food is spot on and everything is much cheaper than the UK. A quick round up of where we’ve been and what I’d recommend:

Colombo- unless you like petrol fumes and the smell of decomposing stray dogs I’d fly in here and stay for 1 or 2 nights tops
Kandy- didnt really think much of this place but then again I’m not really that cultured. 2 nights here was enough for us!
Dambulla- the rocks here are amazing and well worth the visit! Definitely check out AIO homestay if they have a room available, was our favourite accommodation in Sri Lanka
Uppuveli- Lovely beach, plenty to do and snorkeling at Pigeon island was awesome
Arugam bay- one of the best places I’ve ever visited! So relaxed and fun, you will probably spend a bit more money here than in other places but it’s definitely worth it.. pay a few quid more and stay right on the beach! We stayed for 5 days but I still didn’t want to leave
Ella- lovely place with great views and plenty to see. Can definitely recommend Mellow Homestay here. Make sure you’re pretty fit and have decent shoes as the place is hilly as fuck.

Srilanken rupees.. roughly 200 to the £ but it will go far over here!

In total I spent £665 over 3 weeks. Which i think is really good considering the amount we’ve done. We’ve eaten really well here and will both miss the food, public transport is a bit uncomfortable but reliable and dirt cheap. We are flying to Singapore tomorrow for 5 nights which is going to be the most expensive part of our journey but it looks like a cool place! Here are some of my favourite meals and funny photos from here for any of my fellow greedy bastards and weirdos!

I’ve been hitting eggs on toast and a fruit salad for breke most mornings.. this lot (there were 4 eggs but the first 2 vanished pretty quickly!) This set me back about £4

This crazy bastard jackhammering the pavement barefoot! Bet there are a lot of toe-less workers here!

A Sri Lanken family day out in the back of a pick up!

Arugam bay and kumana national park

Arugam bay was the place I was the most excited about visiting during our stay in Sri Lanka. People come from all over the world to surf here and everyone who had visited told us how amazing it was. After 8 hours sweating to death on a cramped, stinking bus we finally arrived!

They cram as many people as humanly possible onto the busses here! But this long journey cost us less that £2 each.. despite the heat it still smelt better than the number 51 to town!

We arrived in Arugam bay late on the monday and our hostel had double booked our room, so they kindly put us up in a decent hotel a couple of doors down for the first two nights.. Probably the last taste of posh accommodation we’ll have for a while! We stayed at Emmas home stay which was a cool hostel right on the beach.

The beach was amazing and the waves were ridiculous and easily the biggest I’ve ever seen. I was keen to get in so the first morning we woke up and rented some body boards! Here’s a video of me catching an average sized wave.. some of them were alot bigger.. I got thrown around like a rag doll and Paige was literally getting dragged up and down the beach! The weather was in the mid 30s here and we both got sun burnt to fuck. On the evening we explored the beach and wandered up to the main surfing point.

The second day we booked up a surfing lesson in the morning, at elephant rock (a beach down the road more for beginners). I managed to get to my feet multpile times but got flung off pretty much straight away so I cant class myself as having surfed but it was fun trying and the closeSt I’ve ever been. Trying to surf here was another goal ticked off for our visit to Sri Lanka!

On the evening we went on a tuk tuk safari around the area and saw some monkeys, buffalo, lots of birds, some elephants in the distance and got pretty close to a massive fucking Croc! Well worth the price of £12 between us for a few hours.

Creeping up to this monster I stood on a stick which broke and made it flinch.. I nearly shat my pants!

The next day we booked a jeep to go to the national park. Saw lots of crocs, birds, fed some monkeys and got pretty close to a couple of elephants. Really impressed me to see these animals in the wild, definitely different to seeing them in a zoo. Visiting a national park was another thing on our Sri Lanken bucket list completed!

Was expecting our jeep to be a piece of shit because we got it quite cheap but was impressed when this beast picked us up!

We were told wild elephants kill a lot of people here in Sri Lanka so we were on our best behaviour!

We liked arugam bay so much we booked in to stay for a 5th night. It Had a great chilled out vibe and there was plenty to do and see. the food was awesome, we tried different places for breakfast and dinner every day and didnt have one bad meal. It was so good that Paige ordered BBQ fish for her meal for the first time ever after trying mine and loved it! She’s really been experimenting with the food out here and is now a massive fan of Sri Lanken food! The last day we did a bit of shopping and relaxed on the beach. Would definitely recommend anyone that likes the beach to visit Arugam bay if they ever visit Sri Lanka!

Finally the East coast! Uppiveli beach

After a sweaty 3 hours on a packed bus we arrived at Trincomalee bus station. Finally we had arrived at the east coast. We were picked up in a tuk tuk by our very friendly one legged host and taken to our digs just off of the beach.

The room was decent but the drains in the bathroom smelt a bit.. we had AC and breakfast included so I was happy! Uppiveli beach was great, really nice chilled out beach with lots of places to eat and things to do

The first day we went for a swim and relaxed on the beach until i got hungry.. I found a review online about Lotus bar saying how nice the food was, no one was eating there which wasn’t a great sign but I trusted the review and went for a big mixed seafood curry.. we went out and met Luke and Hazel who were a couple we met on the bus at fernandos bar but I wasn’t on form due to having to run off to vomit all down the beach and sprint to the toilet with horrendous diareah!

The next day we had planned to go snorkling at pigeon island reef but I was written off so Paige went to the beach whilst I spent the day in bed with more regular dashes to the toilet! My ferocious shitting combined with the bad drains and the warm weather gave our room a strong aroma of what can only be described as “humid poo”!

By that evening I had recovered and we booked our trip to pigeon island reef for the next day. The reef was amazing and we saw some cool fish, a couple of sea turtles and some small sharks.

It was Paige’s first time using a snorkle but shes good at anything in the water and took to it straight away. Despite being a fine athletic specimin of a man I’m a terrible swimmer and am prone to panicking like a little girl! However I find snorkling really relaxing so enjoyed this.

First time testing our go pro out properly in the water

The final day we rented out a Bodyboard and spent our afternoon in the sea. Ive done this alot as a kid in newquay with the family but the waves here were fucking nuts! Caught some good ones and got thrown about like a rag doll on a few! Looking forward to trying a proper surf board at Arugam bay!

Paige asked me if I fancied giving swinging a go..

Great place for a relaxing beach stay, would definitely recommend it! Just watch out not to trip over the stray dogs on the beach at night and don’t eat somewhere if nobody else is lol. Heading to Arugam bay now to get our surf on 😎

Cows just do whatever the fuck they want here!

Dambulla and Sigiriya rock

Climbing Sigiriya rock was one of the things we both really wanted to do in Sri Lanka so we booked a home stay in the near by town city of Dambulla.

AIO home stay were highly rated on booking.com and were very cheap working out about £5 each per night for our room with breakfast included! Can’t say enough good things about this place, Sam and his family who run it have been so helpful and made us feel at home.

Our indoor/outdoor bathroom at AIO homestay

The food here has been absolutely amazing, easily the best we’ve had in Sri Lanka so far. Sam’s mum has cooked us traditional Sri Lankan food that even Paige (who is in the running for world’s fussiest eater) loves. Anyone who knows me knows I love food and can eat like fuck but the portions here are huge and if you finish.. they will juse bring you more! Amazing place with amazing value for money, if you are ever visiting Sigiriya I would highly recommend staying here.

This feast between the two of us came to less than £10.. we even had starters before this!

Dambulla was much less touristy, crowded and smelly than the other places we’ve been so far… On our first day we visited the cave temple which was pretty impressive and definitely worth a visit.

Dambulla cave temple — Paige posing in the temple

There were loads of monkeys around this temple and they are really tame and don’t seem to be bothered by people at all. We also visited the golden temple and a local market. Here’s my favourite photo from the day…

A monkey playing with his cock.. this chap was really going to town on himself outside the temple. He’d have fitted right in at Tog Hill!

The next day we got up bright and early to visit Sigiriya rock. This thing was very impressive and looked like an intimidating climb!

There was already a big crowd queing for tickets even though we caught the first bus in. The robbing bastards charged visitors £23 each for climbing the rock (with locals paying a lot less) so needless to say we had blown our £25 budget each for the day! The place was surrounded by a moat and amazing gardens.

Sigiriya gardens.. the fact that I’m appreciating this could be a sign I’m finally growing up!

The climb itself wasn’t too bad as we were mainly queing up the stairs. There were signs warning about the bees nests and saying if they kicked off we would not be allowed to the top.

It was definitely worth the wait getting to the top as the view was amazing! This is the stuff we both love as neither of us are “city people” and for the first time in Sri Lanka it really felt like we were travelling. We had just ticked off one of the big things from our bucket list!

Fantastic view of the gardens from the rock

Pidurangala rock was the other rock near by, it’s not as well known as Sigiriya and nowhere near as impressive to look at so it’s only costs visitors £2.50. Chatting to people they said the climb was harder, it was quieter and the views were if anything better than Sigiriya so we had to give this one a go too!

The climb was hard and near the top pretty fucking dangerous! This was made even harder by the mid day sun burming down on us. We were followed up by a stray dog after giving him some water and this guy was insane, scrambling up the rocks looking like he was going to kill himself!

Paige and her new mate about to scale the last bit

We made it to the top alive with a few minor scrages but absolutely dripping with sweat. The view was amazing! In my opinion this rock is much better than Sigiriya, it was much cheaper and generally a great experience. there were only a few backpackers at the top and it was so nice to to chill after the hard climb! If you visit Sigiriya and are feeling ballsey give this a go.

Awesome place, really enjoyed it! We are having a down day today before heading to our goal destination of the east coast tomorrow.. Let’s see if these islands and beaches are as amazing as people say!

Watching this little bastard steal a little girls icecream, then eating it right in front of her had me in stitches.. I’m now a massive fan of the monkeys in Sri lanka!

Kandy and Kandy festival

I’d heard mixed reviews about Kandy but because the festival was on we decided to head here on our way to the east coast. It was 160km trip by taxi which took 6 hours because of the bad traffic and shit roads. Even so it only cost just over £30 which we split 3 ways. The drive here was definitely an experience; no one bothers to use lanes and just cuts each other up constantly! Stray dogs and people run out in front of cars and 3 people crammed on a moped is a regular thing.. everyone constantly beeps but no one seems to get angry at all!

Kandy was a step up from Colombo in the sense that it only stank like shit in some places instead of every street Haha. It wasnt quite as hot which was a bit of a relief for a sweaty pig like me! We stayed in “the heart of the city hostel” in a 14 room shared dorm, it had basic facilities but was clean and every one was really nice and helped us with planning our trip around srilanka. I personally sleep like shit in shared dorms so was glad to leave even though the place had a friendly fun vibe. Maggie who we travelled with also stayed here.

The festival was pretty mad, people were sat waiting all afternoon on the pavements for the festival to start at 8.30pm. Summed up its basically they carry “the tooth” (an old religious thing but didn’t get close enough to see it) on the back of an elephant around the temple of kandy, there is fire juggling and dancers and you can tell how important it is to the people here.

The route is fenced off and somehow we managed to get fucking stuck in the centre of it so we were unable to leave until it finished! It goes on for a few hours and all the locals are praying etc so us and other european visitors we met trying to get out got a bit bored before the end.. they don’t even serve alcohol in Kandy during the festival but it was a good laugh none the less. Eventually we got back to our dorm around 12.30am. This festival repeats for 8 days straight but once was enough for us!

The next day we woke up, visited the gym and went out to explore Kandy lake.

The lake was nice and it was good to get away from the crowds. Apart from this there wasn’t a great deal to do in Kandy. I was impressed with the size of the fish in the lake and we saw some fucking huge lizards that looked like they could eat a small dog!

The food here is nice, personally I’d recommend going for a fish option as the chicken is chicken pieces so is more bone and gristle the than meat and the beef is pretty tough and chewy! I couldn’t tell you what the fish was and nor can anyone I’ve asked lol, my farts smell like I’ve been eating Catfood though if that’s any clue?? Paige has been eating mainly vegey foods as she’s not keen on the meat. The average price for a decent sized meal in a resteraunt is £3 or less so we can’t really complain!

After a 2 hour bus journey (which was heaven compared to our last day travelling) we’ve just arrived in Dambulla to visit Sigiriya rock. We’ve got some strong anit histamines as Paiges bites look really bad but we think we’ve got that covered now! Now we’re going to see what Dambulla has to offer 😎 x